An electronic computer aided design (“E-CAD”) package is utilized to construct a Very Large Scale Integration (“VLSI”) circuit design. The VLSI circuit design consists of a netlist that identifies electronic design elements (e.g., capacitors, transistors, resistors, etc.) and their interconnectivity (e.g., signal nets) within the VLSI circuit design. The VLSI circuit design is constructed from hierarchical design blocks (also known as cells) that provide specific functionality to the VLSI circuit design. Such design blocks may be re-used within the VLSI circuit design, or within other circuit designs. Designs blocks may be constructed from electronic design elements, nets and other design blocks, and may be re-used one or more times. Each use of a design block is called an “instance.”
A design engineer uses the E-CAD tool to analyze the VLSI circuit design during development. The E-CAD tool typically traces through instances of blocks used in the VLSI circuit design to sum certain information (e.g., field-effect transistor (“FET”) width, wire capacitance, FET capacitance, etc.). During this analysis, the E-CAD tool typically loads the entire VLSI circuit design into memory. If the VLSI circuit design has billions of design elements, the circuit design uses large amounts of this memory. In certain situations, processing the circuit design becomes limited by the amount of available memory, restricting development and slowing production. Continuous lost productivity due to lengthy engineering development slows technology advancement and can result in significant costs, as well as lost business.